Grace Coddington is leaving Vogue

By Anne Fullerton| 3 years ago

The super stylist will focus on "other projects".

It’s time to light a candle for Grace Coddington’s reign at American Vogue, with news breaking overnight that the creative director and super stylist is stepping down in order to focus on other projects, including a fragrance collaboration with Comme des Garcons.

"After more than 25 years at American Vogue, Grace Coddington will assume the role of Creative Director at Large and take on additional projects outside the magazine,” said a spokesperson.

"She will work on several Vogue fashion shoots throughout the year."

"I’m not running away from Vogue, because it has opened so many doors," Coddington told Business of Fashion. "But it will be nice to collaborate, and nice to go out [and] give talks to people."

The decision came from discussions with her friend and long-time collaborator, Vogue editor Anna Wintour, who Coddington says recognised that she "wanted to branch out a little bit".

Coddington is widely seen as the romantic counterpart to Wintour’s sharp-eyed businesswoman, and enjoyed huge popularity following the release of 2009 documentary The September Issue – thanks in no small part to her willingness to contradict the "feared and revered" editor in chief.

Coddington first worked with Vogue as a model at the age of 19 and has long been an industry stalwart, however the spike in mainstream public interest has given rise to several new opportunities, including her 2012 memoir Grace (later optioned as a film).

This year, Phaidon will release the follow up, Grace: Thirty Years of Fashion at Vogue.

Fans fretting that the change will mean less opportunity to admire Coddington's work needn't worry – in fact, the opposite is true.

"I'm certainly not going into retirement," the 74-year-old told Business of Fashion.